A motivated cast and a motivated director have found each other at College Heights secondary school.
There are so many signs of intelligent life in that mix, that they chose an ironic title to produce for this semester's play. No Signs of Intelligent Life, a bustling comedy by Bryan Starchman runs today and Friday.
The cast is, obviously, young but many members already have an on-stage pedigree like Thierry Maillot, Dawson Rutledge and Steven Lennard who are 17, 17 and 16 respectively. Each of them has multiple characters to play in this show, as do all 15 cast members (some as many as three parts, none with less than two, and all with set-change duties as well). They are under the direction and CHSS drama teacher Audrey Rowell.
"The whole drama program has gotten three or four times bigger since Mrs. Rowell got here," said Maillot. "We've always had good teachers working with us, but Mrs. Rowell's focus is drama, it's her thing, and for me that's important because it's also my thing."
He is interested in pursuing theatre arts as a possible profession or life augmentation skill. He and Rutledge have their sights set on the acclaimed drama department at the University of Victoria while Lennard is newer to theatre but confessed "now that I've had this experience, I'm considering what this might offer as a profession."
They all remember distinctly when they fell in love with the performing arts.
"I remember in Grade 8 there was no drama class for us, but there was a lunchtime theatre thing we could do on our own, and I had such a fun time with that that I couldn't wait for Grade 9."
Lennard said, "This is my first play but I was thinking about doing drama for a bunch of years, I just never had room for it (on his academic schedule) until now. I'm just glad I get a chance to finally do it."
This year represents a change in the game for the student actors, said Maillot, thanks to Rowell recognizing the level of their appetite. He said No Signs of Intelligent Life "is such a difference from (last year's play) Squad Room. That was a standard play, and we've always done standard plays, and that's fine, but this is not at all that sort of thing. This play is a bunch of scenes that are connected but separate, and part of what we have to do as actors is transform the set between each scene and be responsible for the transition as well as the action. And some of the lines have some double meaning, I was wondering for awhile if we were going to get in trouble for some of them, but it's all good. We figured out how to deliver them."
Some of the original script got reworked by the teen actors themselves. As the lines were delivered, Rowell spotted opportunities for the instincts of the performers to improve on things, within the context of their own CHSS world.
"It's all about alien observation of humans," said Rutledge. "The whole point is, the aliens can't understand human society, but they are trying to fit in. But they don't get it, so they're always messing up in our eyes, but to themselves, they think they're blending in with us. We (actors) have to work with that - being refined in our acting portrayal, but also pulling off this obliviousness, ignorant idiot thing, the alien characters have going on."
There is a physical communication going on with these portrayals as well as the lines they need to speak. "For me, I'm throwing up at one point. There's the time someone sticks their fork in an electrical outlet and have to pretend to get electrocuted. Your body has to act that stuff out," said Lennard.
It reminded Rutledge of his turn in the play Buckshot & Blossoms where his only line was "Oh, Andy" but he had to deliver it dozens of times and never the same way twice.
Maillot said this play was a physical workout, too, as well as a mental challenge, because of all the rearranging of furniture done by the actors as each vignette changed over. There are no blackouts to work with, just an unbroken flow of scenes.
"You have to really pay attention, but having to change the sets on the fly is useful in making us all aware of everything going on. We are better at the characters because we have to know the script so thoroughly. I mean, one of my cues is someone shouting 'RANDYYYYYY!' so if I miss that one I deserve a five-day suspension, but all the set pieces are boxes, and we have to grab them and move them to new places all the time, and what if something gets missed or put in the wrong place? Now we have to deal with that, and not mess up the lines or break character. There is a script we all have to work with, but you also have to always be ready for improvisation and dealing with mistakes happening right in front of you."
Rowell said it was a professional pleasure to work on this production, especially since there was such a range of experience levels and even a range of student personality types to work into the play. Everything from high academics to special-needs and alternate-education profiles are among these students, but that, she said, is the key strength of drama as a school subject. It is built to be inclusive.
"I knew I could challenge this cast. To be honest, they were the ones challenging me to find something they could really sink their teeth into," said Rowell, a veteran drama teacher in School District 57 but only in her second year at CHSS where there was no culture of dramatic arts the way there is at some other secondary schools in the area.
"You can't just walk out on stage and say the lines and deliver the full impact of the play - pull off the humour," Rowell said. "Comedic timing is, well, it is a particular kind of skill and this cast, I knew, could do that. One of the reasons I picked this script was because it allowed for that diversity and inclusiveness we had with the students, but also because when I was reading it alone to myself in my office, I was laughing out loud. It's a very funny play, and these are kids who can nail the humour. I know they can."
No Signs of Intelligent Life happens at 7 p.m. today and Friday at CHSS. Tickets are $10 adult, $5 students and seniors, $2 children under 12.
